Solo Dirt

[Bennar Witt]

32nd of Spring, 515 A.V.
Trail of Waterfalls.

The Trail provided a vastly more pleasurable than the last time he had slunk down the pale, snowy way. Now it was bright and warm. The floorboards of the trail were swept clean of dirt, though a layer of flower petals were strewn across certain areas, and pollen could be seen in a thin yellow powder in others. His boots made a muffled clumping as he walked with an excited purpose. Benji had been given a few nights off because Deniss, Rynas, and Naia had some sort of other business to attend to, and he could not very well work without them there.

Syna’s touch made Benji’s brown hair bronze slightly when he passed under her rays. Though he had a thin layer of sweat from the heat, he was enjoying the Spring weather immensely. Though the view was spectacular, and the rushing waterfalls made music no instrument could reproduce, his purpose for being here was not to enjoy the scenery of the Trail.

He was here to collect and research in the name of his reimancy. Paranoid about performing magic in public, especially now that people partook of the outdoor aspects of Lhavit more frequently, he had been spending long hours of his time off in his apartment. Though it was not ideal for magic, its privacy won out when compared with a potential run in with the Shinya.

His task for today had been inspired by watching a gardener churn soil on his walk to the Mhakula Tea House. He produced the same type of soil with his reimancy, and had never been able to change that. But if he could find some other types of earth from outside Lhavit he may be able to familiarize himself with them enough to expand his repertoire.

As Benji stepped along the well kept trail he kept an eye out for any appealing samples. He had a small, smooth stone in his pocket as well as a clump of dried, tan earth. He was still hopefully to find something else that would catch his eye, but he had no idea if he was looking for anything in particular. It was very hard to search for something you had been seeing every day since you could remember. Dirt was, maybe, the most common thing in the world. Given that, he had no idea what constituted quality dirt. He was no farmer!

Eventually he gave up the search, deciding these two samples were good enough for today. He walked the rest of the trail in silence, lost in thought about how he would go about his experiment. The usual tickling of fear that he associated with reimancy was not present, the earthen nature of the experiment giving him comfort. Fire was the real threat. This was not without dangers, he knew, but it was decidedly not as dangerous as the pyromancy he had already experienced.

Eventually Benji found himself back at the entrance to Lhavit, a small stone gateway. A couple passed him, lost in their own romance. He paid them no heed, too preoccupied with getting back to his apartment to notice others. As he walked through the streets of Lhavit he did give the occasional Shinya a perfunctory bow of the head. It paid to respect the local law, and be known to respect it.

Once inside his apartment, the Alvadan pulled out the dirt and the stone. He set them carefully apart upon his table and sat. For a moment he poked and prodded both, looking for distinguishing features, but felt silly doing so.

They’re a rock and some petching dirt.

But first things first. Perhaps having a sample of his default magiced earth would provide him with good grounds to start. Benji sighed and closed his eyes. He began the familiar focus ritual that had come with his initial training in the manipulation of djed. As he did this, his djed was easily identified. Benji felt the rush of pleasure as he let it pulled out of his palms. The scars on his hands shone in the sunlight bleeding through the window. The res he made from his palms was minute and a congealed solid substance.

He moved it to hover between the small dirt pile and the stone on his table. With a momentary flash of willpower and a satisfied surge of thrill, he transmuted it to the dark earth he was accustomed to seeing.

Wonderful, now I have two piles of dirt and a rock.

[Bennar Witt]

Benji bent and set his chin against the table in front of the piles. He closed one blue eye and peered earnestly at the dirt in an attempt to see details more clearly. Well, they were obviously different. The dirt that he had created was darker and clumped together in larger pieces. The form it had taken upon creation had not crumbled much when it hit the table. The pile from the trail was just that, a pile. It had either crumbled when he set it down, or else was rubbed to smaller pieces in his pocket as he walked home.

Benji sighed and watched particles of the dirt blow gentle across the tabletop. He sat up and rubbed at the darker dirt, trying to get a feel for its consistency. Then he did the same for the trail dirt. Though both had a unique feel in his fingers he could not find a discernible difference that he could use. Benji sighed and rubbed his eyes. Doubt snuck its way into his mind now. What was he doing? Why had he thought this would work? Self-doubt was a huge obstacle when it came to his reimancy. He hadn’t had much instruction at all, gleaning what he could from prior lessons from Lori and adapting methods from his shielding and morphing lessons. It had been a long and arduous journey to just produce the res. Now he was trying to expand on his rough knowledge base, but without guidance.

But greatness was not found with a guide.

Benji took a pinch of each between his thumb and forefinger and rubbed again. The dark was rougher, the lighter trail dirt had a much finer grain. Or that was how he felt at least. He had not spent much time scrutinizing soils before. Benji looked at his fingers and tried to see the difference.

With his own tanned skin as a backdrop, he could see the difference in the minuscule grains of dirt. Okay, there was something at least. That he could work with. That he could replicate. Or so he thought.

Once again Benji started to focus. Breathing in deeply, he tried to clear his head, emptying all but the blackness behind his eyelids. He breathed again, wrestling with the self-doubt. That was always the most stubborn of emotions to go, that and fear. But eventually he was able to banish the negative emotion and his mind was pleasantly clear.

The res poured from him with little effort. The stuff clumped together in front of his hand. Benji peered at it intently. He focused on the characteristics of the lighter trail dirt he had observed. Benji willed the res to take on those characteristics. Then he smiled, satisfied that once he transmuted the res it would work.

The young mage sent the flash of willpower. He felt the rush of satisfaction once again as he did so. He tried to ignore the tingling pleasure that ran over his skin. Magic was a deadly companion, in a large part due to the intense pleasure one derived from it while at the same time damaging their own… soul?

When he glanced down at the newly transmuted dirt it was the same as his usual geomanced stuff.

Shyke.

[Bennar Witt]

The dirt stood stalwart on the table, oblivious to his hateful glare. Benji’s resolve that had been so solid, so forceful, all day began to waver for the second time since entering the apartment. But instead of letting that dissuade him from success, he put the dirt conundrum off for a the time being. He could return to the myriad of challenges in changing soil types later. For now he would concentrate on the stone. Stone was probably more useful than having a variety of dirt types. Perhaps the radical difference between dirt and stone would make it easier to replicate with res.

He was optimistic.

Benji took the stone in his palm. It was warm from sitting in his pocket for the better part of two bells. He rubbed his thumb across the surface with a pointedly focused precision. The thing was smooth, but had tiny holes and pores in the stone that were probably the product of a few hundred years under a river or stream.

Benji went throughout the concentration ritual again. He ignored the dread of the pleasure this next spout of magic would bring. He had been told very early on that such things were not to be indulged, but to be feared and treated with caution.

Of course, Lori followed that up by saying that if it got really bad I wouldn’t be able to resist the pleasure of it. That is sort of a dangerous spiral to fall into.

This time Benji concentrated on the tiny pores. He shaped the res that spewed from his hands with a critical eye. Or mind’s eye. He let tiny gaps in the res pop up throughout the small rounded orb that he formed. He willed them to pepper the res’s surface as well, just as they did with the real stone. He felt confidence strengthening his resolve, like ink in a glass of water it leaked through the blankness of his mind. Confidence, a deviously disguised pleasure…

Benji’s command held a bit more power than he had intended to use when transmuting the res. But he was confident, and it might help. He watched excitedly as the change came over the res and it fell to the table like the two before it. And the dark dirt crumbled a bit as it hit the tabletop, like those before it.

Benji screamed in frustration. He stood up and kicked over the stool he had been sitting on. He put so much into his magic, all for this! So much stress, so much passion. So much damn emotion!

Benji punched the tabletop and pinched a handful of the dirt. He raised his fist and threw it at the window. It flew apart before coming close and rained down upon his floor. Great, you dolt. Something else you have to clean up.

Benji sat on the floor and rubbed his temples. He chased his doubt and his resolve around dark thoughts in his head. He spent the next half a bell chasing away the odd mixture of despair at failure and the thrill that was the shadow of overgiving.

[Bennar Witt]

Nothing in the room moved. Benji least of all. He was partially trying to regain his emotional composer, and partly trying to recollect his motivation. The magic was a harrowing thing, so much of the time he could barely deal with this addiction. He had called I a hobby to others, in public. But during the twilight hours of his slumber, all alone, he knew it more than that. He knew it to be a need more than a want.

And yet here he was, slumped on his floor. An emotionally wounded youth with an irrational attachment to a god-complex that scared him more than anything else.

God-complex.

It sort of was that. Every mage was tempting fate when they altered the balance of the world, even the balance of their own djed. He laughed at the nature of it all. A mere mortal blindly risking life and limb for the ultimate hubris. Only fools reached for such powers. But a fool he was.

Benji struggled to his feet again. The room seemed to witness this moment with an intensity, the walls judging this sin.

Fool or not, I will make stone.

He slipped a foot under the seat of the overturned stool and lifted it. Catching it in his grasp, Benji righted it with a forceful slam against the floor. He picked up the stone from the table and stared balefully at it. He felt like shouting a threat at it, or a promise of success. But that would be stupid. He felt slightly embarrassed that he had stared menacingly at it in the first place.

Then a simple idea slid into his mind. A simple ray of brilliance in the cloudy doubt of the day. Perhaps his day had not been wasted. Perhaps he could still salvage this experiment. Early on in his experimentation with reimancy he had found that his res would mimmic certain substances if it came into contact with the natural stuff. Perhaps if he concentrated he could observe that happening with the stone and recreate it.

Benji breathed a few times to slow his heart, trying to keep the rise and fall of his chest even and shallow. He knew he was close to his limit. Such things were not to be risked usually, but he was too emotionally invested. He needed this. Benji decided that he would just have to be careful in his casting.

The focus came easily, almost too easily. Benji ignored the thrill of pleasure that was more than it had been the last time he attempted to pull from his body yet more res. Benji let it slide itself into a solid ball about the size of a marble. Benji’s arm grew stiff from the strain of the constant flexing. He was so determined to will this to work he was cramping up his muscles in the arm.

He let the res brush against the stone with his mind. The stuff immediately started to transmute when it came into contact with the natural stone. Benji concentrated on the actual transmutation, trying very hard to ignore the whispers in his mind that urged him to continue to make res, to continue to cast… He tried to observe as the res, his body’s essence shifted in reality, it’s djed changing outward from the point of contact.

Before he knew it, the transmutation was done and there were two stones sitting on his table. He grinned in triumph. This was not really a victory, since he still hadn’t created stone with his own willpower and mind. But it was something. Benji picked up the new stone, exactly the same texture as the natural one from the trail.

[Bennar Witt]

The new stone was a milestone. Benji took it as a symbol of progress, of a move in the right direction. He decided that he was not a lost, floundering mageling, but a practiced wizard. He could easily replicate the process. It was just that he had not seen it happen before. He had not felt the transmutation in his last attempts. With this new breakthrough he was obliged to try one more time. No matter how his mind whispered to him, urging him to do just that. He told himself that his logic was saying the same thing, and that was much more trustworthy than the whispers.

Benji felt the urge and excitedly began to clear his mind once more. The process happened almost instantly, a sign that would send chills down his spine in any other circumstance. But today he was going to make headway. Today would be a victory in his upward struggle with the magics that so plagued his mind and his passion. Today he would show Lori! The thought shocked him, and he felt stupid for letting it ring in his head.

She’s gone, petched off long ago. Probably got wise about all this magic stuff.

He forced the memory of his old friend out of his head, instead turning his gaze to the stones on his tabletop. For the second time he cleared his mind. The ease with which the whole process happened was lost on him this time. He knew it would work now. He knew he could create a stone. He could create a petching boulder now!

He began the expulsion of res from the sweaty palm in his right hand. He stood in the room, straining mentally, his arm stretched forward. You can do it… You can do anything… He could. He would do it.

Benji’s res slid from him at a quicker pace. The essence spilling eagerly from his palm. He had more to spare. He was going to make quite a stone, then Lori would see. He felt the intense pleasure of it then, and it caught at his heart and numbed his mind. The res surged forth and the glob in midair was now the size of his own head.

Transmute it now, before you are overcome! A sliver of rational thought shone like a beacon in his mind. He surged forth with his willpower, commanding the res to turn to stone. He watched with a wide grin as the res began to change. The surface turned from the odd ethereal substance to a dark brown. A dark brown dirt.

Rage filled his soul.

Benji clenched his jaw. He poured more res into the glob, now sending a constant stream onto it. Desperation rode his command to the substance now. It continued to turn to soil and he continued to will it to be rock. But his heart soared with the rush of it. He was so powerful! He could do this. There was no problem, yet.

Stop.

No! He needed this! He needed this stone to be made. He could not live without it. It was so simple, he had the power. He would just continue until he got it right. Benji felt a creeping pain in his hand and heart. He tasted iron in his mouth. After a moment he realized it was because he had bit his tongue. He was clenching his teeth and could not stop himself.

And the res poured forth. It was still turning to soil. But now Benji was in pain. The pain rode the wake of the wild pleasure the casting was causing. The whispers in his head were becoming bursts of bold encouragement. Benji felt a cold wash of fear, terror really. This should not be happening.

Res was sealing out of the pores on his arm. It was building inside, under his skin in places. Still the glob of dirt was growing. Still some wild part of his mind was telling him to keep going. His focus shuttered and the glob fell. Res sprayed out into random patterns in the air. Pain wracked him, numbing the mind so much he could do nothing to stop it.

His res transmuted seemingly without his thought. Some turning to dirt, and some to stone to fall heavily to the floor, denting his floorboards. His room has in chaos and his heart beat a wild beat against his ribs.

I’m going to petching die!

He tried to bring down his arm, but he realized dumbly that he could not. Convulsions were shaking his entire body. He couldn’t breath. His mind was on fire. He was going to die in agony. Something hard hit him in the face.

The floor.

His feet kicked against the floorboards as his face rubbed them. He heard stones and dirt hitting the floor around him. Then it happened. A searing pain in his right arm so horrible that it transcended his mind’s ability to deal with it. It was as though something was ripping his arm apart. Then his vision blurred and it all went black.

[Bennar Witt]

Benji woke up some time later to the burning in his eyes. Tears were wetting them. In a heartbeat he felt an agony that was both smooth and excruciating in his arm. He groaned and whimpered pathetically, rolling over onto his back. Weak from the convulsions, he realized he was covered in sweat. The mage cried some more before opening his eyes again. He could barely stand the agony, he needed it to be over.

He opened his eyes and turned his gaze to his arm.

Oh shyke, oh shyke, oh shyke!

Protruding from the skin and underneath the skin were horribly figured stones. The res that had clumped around his pores had been turned to stone before it was pulled from him. Blood congealed around the edges of the ones that broke the skin, and he could see dark bulges that did not bode well around the ones that did not break the skin. Benji counted seven in total, all about marble size or a bit bigger.

“Oh petching shyke. SHYKE!” He screamed to the room at large.

He did not have the strength to walk, so he crawled and rolled his way over to his pack. It lay beside the now ruined table. A large stone had apparently fallen on the table and smashed the corner and the leg underneath it. He fumbled with the pack until he found his dagger. Benji whimpered with the effort of drawing it.

He grimaced at the pain of moving his right arm onto his lap. He stared down at the dagger, dreading what he was about to do. Benji yelled out in a strained voice like a wounded animal as he dug into his arm to cut out the first of the stones. The pain was so intense he felt consciousness wavering again. He thought there would be relief as the bloody stone fell to the floor, but the pain continued.

He repeated this with the others for about a bell, taking long breaks to let his head stop spinning and his hand stop shaking. On the fourth one he had passed out again from the pain. But he forced himself to continue when he woke again. The arm looked gruesome when he was finally finished, and his skin was a pale chalky white from the loss of blood. He had deep, deep wounds that he hurriedly wrapped his bed sheet around.

He would be left with some nasty scars, and some nasty gauges taken out of his arm, but he tested the mobility of it gingerly. He could move it, and he could make a grip in his hand, though it hurt. By Krysus it hurt! Benji laid back, his head against the backpack. The pain had diminished some. He just wanted to sleep, to forget about the agony. But that could kill him.

Instead he rolled over and stumbled to his feet. It took three or four tries, but he was able to stand shakily. He fell back into his broken table with a grunt of pain. The mage panted, breathing was an effort. He was just thinking that he would die before getting to a healer when there was a knock on his door.

“C-come in.” He strained to say. It came out barely more than a whisper. Benji took a deep breath. He repeated himself with all his might. It might have carried to the hallway beyond his apartment.

An old man and a woman, presumably his daughter, appeared in the doorway. “He heard screaming…” The woman began. Her voice trailed off to be replaced by rthe heavy silence of their mutual shock.

Both stared at the trashed room.

“Please… Help me get to a doctor.”

[Brandon Blackwing]

BENNAR WITT

XP:

• Observation +5
• Reimancy +4
• Investigation +2
• Geology +2
• Meditation +2
• Endurance +2
• Dagger +1
• Medicine +1
• Socialization +1

Lore:

• Geology: The differences between normal Lhavitian dirt and transmuted dirt
• Personal Magic: Uses your soul as fuel
• Geology: Effects of a river on a rock
• Reimancy: My Res mimics natural substances when coming in contact with them.
• Magic: The Sweet Whispers
• Magic: The telltale signs of going into overgiving
• Magic: The effects of Overgiving with Reimancy
• Medicine: Cutting stones out of your arm
• Medicine: Bandaging wounds

Notes:
Awesome! Great work! A very entertaining and interesting magic solo!

You have been rewarded with seven beautiful scars on your arm. It will probably take around five weeks to heal enough to remove the stitches, I think. Then probably a couple weeks more until it's fully healed. Anyway, keep it bandaged, and don't use it too much for best results. Maybe a sling will help?

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credit goes to Adelaide Sitai